doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Lead and wildlife: 52 reports on impacts

Hello Mr. Jones, etc:

For those that want to question my bona fides, I've been hunting since I was 10, reload and target shoot around 1000 high power rifle and shotgun rounds a year (mostly lead-based), and have been harvesting 50-150 wild upland birds, waterfowl and big game animals annually for the last 20 years (mostly steel/bismuth/copper ammo). I plan to continue both. Need pictures?

Regards,
Ben

P.S. "Evolve" whispered the bird to the dinosaur. The dinosaur should have listened. Uh oh. I supposed I just started another argument....

"The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" said Chicken Little to Fox. Fox said "Come over here Chicken Little and I will give you a helmet." Chicken Little shouldn't have listened to Fox.

Why you repeated yourself went over my head.

Again, what is it that you are trying to get people to change about how they shoot?

Or are you just trolling - baiting the reactionaries and the ignorant rednecks (in your mind)?

Best,


Mike

Mike:

Read the studies, and you'll answer your own question.

Then we'll have something to talk about, or at least debate. Right now I'm boxing with a bunch of blind men. No fun. Really.

Signing off until the first of the many "experts" on this website does their homework....

Ben

Well I am sorry punching us around is no fun for you.

How about the study I linked to. Do you have any comments on it. I didn't read anything that made me feel like changing my hunting protocol, lead shot and all.


Best,

Mike

Deeble you Jerk! have I ever been to Montana? yes, last week in point of fact. Am I comeing back? yes, 7-8th of next month. Have you ever been to reality? I doubt it, you sack of s**t.When did you move to Montana from California? You are really tiresome.......

From a study at Dartmouth:

"Iron overdoses can be severe in human beings, especially children, but its effects within ecosystems can be far more widespread and circuitous. As with humans, iron is essential to most living organisms. Animals, plants, and even bacteria require the metal for proper metabolism. However, when human activities alter the geochemistry within an ecosystem and allow for chemical interactions with iron that would not normally occur in nature, iron quickly becomes an accomplice in many insidious environmental problems."


When lead shot has been successfully banned there will be an effort to do the same with steel shot. Based on the study not only can increases in iron cause "insidious environmental problems" but iron poison is the #1 cause of death by poisoning to children. It occurs when children get adult vitamins but that bit of information will certainly be omitted. It is guaranteed that the average dolt will be easily convinced that if iron kills more children than any other form of poison we should stop firing it from guns.

So why has there been no push to stop its use already? Because most of those that sit idly by while lead is being further restricted wouldn't if they realized that steel is next in line for the chopping block. Instead the same people that are pushing to ban lead will wait until hunters and/or shooters have shot themselves in the foot by letting lead shot be further restricted or banned. Let's not let that happen, and let's certainly not let the Deebles out there shoot us in the back.

I am aware of a couple of situations where non-toxic shot restrictions have been relaxed or repealed. The only federally mandated restriction on lead shot is for waterfowl. Any other restrictions are made at the state level and can be overturned. If your state has additional restrictions on the use of lead I recommend that you get some supportive data and go on the offensive. The only way you will stop the ever expanding agenda of the eco-nazis is to fight back.

With "extensive" experience like that, plenty of us would be quite right to question your bona fides.
RG

Might even question his sanity.

Grouse Guy, what is the name of this website? Would you expect, posting on a website called doublegunshop--most of the participants of which shoot classic side by sides through which steel should not be shot--that you would receive a warm welcome when you post about the dangers of lead? Yup, you bet . . . we all want to run out and pay $3 a pop for those costly nontoxic alternatives to steel, just so we can continue to shoot our classic doubles. Makes perfect sense to me.

Raptors occasionally die as a result of secondary ingestion of lead. That's obviously of concern to an organization called "The Peregrine Fund". However, what they, you, and everyone else concerned have to remember is this: Unless a wildlife species is endangered or threatened (like the condor, for example), you do not manage the species based on occasional fatalities to individual members of that species. You manage the species based on the overall health of the species. Back when lead was banned for waterfowl, the eagle was one of the "poster birds", because eagles were dying from secondary ingestion of lead from unrecovered waterfowl. Well, the raptor rehabilitators here in Iowa tell me that's still happening--now mostly (or so they think) from unrecovered deer. A dead deer has to look like a pretty decent meal to a hungry bald eagle! However, is the species in trouble because of deaths due to lead ingestion? Au contraire! Bald eagles went from endangered to threatened to delisted. In Iowa, we went from two nesting pairs in the mid-80's to 200 nesting pairs currently. The most recent midwinter bird survey in Iowa counted 3,000 bald eagles. So, while lead may indeed be a problem for individual eagles, the species is not only not hurting as a result, but is in fact thriving.

If something ain't broke, it's not a good idea to try to fix it, because you're very likely to break something else in the process. Steel remains more expensive than lead. The major threat to wildlife, as far as hunting is concerned, comes from crippling. Steel is not as efficient as lead, and it is also more expensive--which means shooters will practice less if lead is banned. (They're likely going to practice less as it is, given the economy. So we want to add an additional expense on top of the economic problems?) So what do we end up doing? Crippling and losing more gamebirds. The raptor people might not mind that. More food for their preferred species, and none of that nasty old lead for them to ingest.

I suspect that Ben doesn't give his name because he's not authorized to speak for NWF. He certainly is not helping them with his ham fisted approach. I would suggest that someone forward this thread over to them. I suspect they wouldn't be to happy with it.